Listening and understanding what other people have to say doesn’t diminish you. It expands you. What you would like others to do for you is a good idea to do for them. Listening and understanding others’ hearts and minds is not a disservice to yourself. It is not capitulating. It is not giving an advantage to another. It is not putting others before you. It is listening and understanding. Listening and understanding are gifts of growth and courtesy and, let’s say it, love.
 
No two people see alike. No two people. And yet you can see how another sees and feels, and you can understand.
 
The question is not which way is better. There is no question. This is how two people see. What of it?
 
Why fight it, beloveds? Who says that one way is better or better for another? Or that the way you see is right, and the way another sees is not? Why would you imagine someone has to see the way you do and not see the way he does?
 
This is judgment, dear ones, and judgment is something to stay away from, even in the little things. Everyone knows better than to judge, and yet judgment occurs often, too many times a day to count, or too many times an hour or even a minute to waste your time on. Besides, judgment is fruitless.  
 
If you really want others to view the world as you do, listen to their views. Maybe then others will be better able to listen to yours. And if someone cannot listen to you, at least you heard him out and perhaps you understood. It is helpful to yourself and to another to understand. Consider that listening is like learning another language.
 
Anyway, would you really want everyone to think just as you do? Be careful how you answer. Would you really want to think the way the so-called “everyone else” thinks? Who is everyone else, this public persona? And who are you, dear one?
 
You may be the first to require freedom and then forget to grant it to others. If you truly believe in freedom, then give it. If you truly believe in freedom, live it.
 
Ah, then again, there is a difference between freedom and license. There is not even agreement on that. And that’s all right too.
 
I gave you free will, and you are free to honor others by listening to what they have to say. You also are free to not listen to others as well. You are free to close your mind or to open it and to whatever degree you wish. You are free to fight when you want to. You are free to get up and walk out of the room.
 
Be wary of sticking up for principles. They are your chosen principles. You chose them. Must another also choose them? The principles, no matter how well they work for you, are opinions you chose. You had free choice. No one can be made to believe as you do. Others can try to believe as you do, yet why should they when their heart isn’t in it?
 
There is room for everyone in the world. There is room for everyone in the world to make his own choices. All people can even change their minds when they do, and change back again. Some people are homebodies. And some people have a yen for adventure. Aren’t both okay?
 
There are human beings of many shapes and colors. Welcome all.